Billionaires' Bunkers

Hello and welcome to 2024’s first edition of Real Green Estate! 2023 was a strange year for me personally, with incredible highs and lows of raising venture capital funding in a post 0% interest rate environment. But I’m feeling somewhat recovered and definitely excited for what the new year will bring.??

2023 was also a strange year for climate. It was confirmed to be the hottest year on record, while COP28 turned into a farce (despite promising the “beginning of the end of fossil fuels”) and the UK government ploughed ahead with new oil and gas licences that will be issued annually.?

Desperate ploy to win older conservative voters (who of course won’t be around to experience the worst effects of climate change), or greedy cash-grab before the possibility of losing the general election? You decide, honestly, because I find the whole thing exhausting.?

Chris Skidmore, who was responsible for signing the UK’s net zero commitment by 2050 into law, also decided he’s had enough, announcing his resignation at the start of January. He wrote on Twitter (I’m still not used to calling it X):

“I am writing to formally resign as a Member of Parliament […]

The message of the Net Zero Review was clear. Net Zero is an opportunity, not a cost. Across the country, businesses and industries recognise this opportunity as a moment to create new jobs, new growth […]

There is now no economy without a green economy. This is a moment in time that will not come again, and it is a moment that the UK cannot afford to let slip. Across the world, other countries have woken up to the fact that better energy security and lower cost energy will be better delivered through renewable and clean power”

I’ve pulled this from the first couple of paragraphs. Note how he doesn’t even get into the dangers of continuing to burn fossil fuels to our environment and our health, but focuses on how investing in oil and gas makes no economical sense. If we truly live in a capitalist society, and not a corrupt one, other industries should really be leveraging Skidmore’s argument to divest government funding away from what is essentially a money pit.

Like tech, for instance. Unfortunately, it appears that tech billionaires are more interested in building doomsday bunkers than they are in securing the longevity of their own businesses (nevermind ‘making the world a better place’ ??).

At the end of last year, a post on LinkedIn caught my eye, detailing Mark Zuckerberg’s $270 million bunker currently under construction in Koolau Ranch, Hawaii. The 5,000-sq-ft underground shelter will supposedly have its own energy and food supplies, along with a blast-resistant door. Impressive as it is, this is just the tip of the iceberg. The upper echelons of the super wealthy have been planning for the apocalypse for years.

They call it ‘The Event’: a euphemism for the “very real and present danger of climate change, rising sea levels, mass migrations, global pandemics, nativist panic, and resource depletion”. When Douglas Rushkoff was asked to consult a small group of the super-wealthy, their most burning question was how they would be able to maintain authority over their security teams “once money was worthless”. (Douglas’ whole article is excellent by the way, and he also has a book on the topic: Survival of the Richest).

The irony is that these bunkers will rely heavily on renewable technologies to achieve ‘off-grid’ living, such as rain water harvesting and solar panels, along with sustainable, local food production (you know, because the rest of the world will either be burning or barren). But, of course, we can’t adopt carbon neutral living now, before climate collapse. No, of course, not. Our tech overlords still need their private jets and slave labour to squeeze out a few more billion before things really do pass the point of no return.

Before diving too deep into that depressing rabbit hole, I should remember that an apocalypse bunker really is the pathetic, worst-choice option: “We don’t have to use technology in such antisocial, atomizing ways. We can become the individual consumers and profiles that our devices and platforms want us to be, or we can remember that the truly evolved human doesn’t go it alone.

Being human is not about individual survival or escape. It’s a team sport. Whatever future humans have, it will be together.”

Thanks, Douglas.

?? News Roundup

?? Modulous, the modulor homes startup, set to go into administration. After failing to raise additional VC funding, has filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators. A sad blow to the sustainable promise of modulor housing.

?? The UK Green Building Council released their Whole Life Carbon Roadmap Progress Report, revealing that the built environment must reduce emissions nearly twice as fast as progress to date, in order to achieve climate targets.

?? Nuclear power is in the spotlight as the Civil Nuclear Roadmap is launched by UK Gov, outlining the plan to increase the generation of nuclear energy by up to 4 times through constructing both large and small power plants (check out this video on Small Modular Reactors for a useful overview of emerging nuclear technology).

?? Nominations for the Global ESG Awards for the best solutions and individuals engaged in construction & real estate are open until 31st January. Time to get voting!